The present invention relates to multi-application based systems on a mobile computing device and more specifically, this invention relates to a method to prioritize applications based on user context on a mobile computing device.
Multiple applications often run simultaneously on mobile devices, for example smart phones, tablets, watches, etc. Two or more applications may be in the foreground of the operating system at the same time and thus may compete for output notifications, either by audio, visual, haptic, or textual responses. Thus, the interruption of one application with a notification from another application may interfere with the user's quality of experience. For example, while a user is listening to a podcast on the mobile device, the turn-by-turn navigation application interrupts the podcast with directions. The interruption by the turn-by-turn application may compete with the audio output and subsequently talk over the podcast without the podcast pausing. The user may miss a critical section of the podcast and receive a non-urgent direction instead.